The Importance of the Bridge

Yes, over the winter break, my father, brother, brother-in-law and I built a bridge. The bridge you see in the picture on the right is the bridge that we built. It spans over 38ft and has a height of about 14ft.

Why build a bridge ? We could have easily put up two planks of wood across the stream. Why did we build it in winter? why not wait till summer or spring at least.

The answer of the second and third question is simple; we had winter break and we had time on our hands, we might as well use it wisely.

Why a bridge? I have a strong belief in developing my capabilities (and those of my kids:)) by utilizing ones own hands and skills. Why do it? why learn? why not call a handyman? simply because by building myself and my capabilities, and by learning how to use my hands and brain I do not have to depend on others (such as the government) to secure my present and future. Instead, I learn to depend only on Allah, who is the only true one that sustains and nourishes all creation, followed by my capacity to use the skills and knowledge and body that God bestowed upon me to work hard for a living. In other words, it gives me independence.

I trace these ideas and the need for me to be able to independently utilize my skills to my father. In my early years, I have almost no memories of my father inside our home. Instead my memories are filled with trips to my father’s cloth factory (where I played with cardboard boxes), or his tool store (where he build me my first desk), or the heater factory he managed, or his exporting company and so on. I probably visited almost every company he owned or worked for in the last 15 years. However, my father did not stop at taking me to his workplace. He also used to give my siblings and I manual work associated with his jobs; whether it was sorting papers, making excel worksheets/autocad drawings (specific to Ibrahim only) or cutting wood and drilling. This gave my siblings and I a plethora of experiences and skills that we have used in our college/work careers and continues to benefit us everyday.

Yep, that was one of the reasons I asked my father to build a bridge and why I bought two houses in Lafayette. Hopefully under my father tutelage, I will gain necessary experiences in rebuilding homes and entrepreneurship skills.

If you thought that I was going to spend time and talk about the process of how the bridge was built. Forget it, but I am now working on fixing a house and if you want to learn, then welcome to my crew.